“I was framed”

Indictments Name 4 in New Mexico Case

A former Democratic state senator and three other people were charged with corruption Thursday in a case that a former federal prosecutor has told Congress he believes led to his firing.

A federal grand jury accused the senator and former president pro tem of the New Mexico Senate, Manny Aragon, and the others of conspiring to skim $4.2 million in public funds meant for construction of a county courthouse.

David Iglesias, one of eight United States attorneys removed late last year, told Congress this month that he had rejected what he believed to be pressure from Senator Pete V. Domenici and Representative Heather A. Wilson, Republicans of New Mexico, to rush the indictments, which would have hurt Democrats in the November elections.

More from the ABQ News.

This is surprising. Maybe, now that Iglesias is out of the way, the New Mexico Republicans have proceeded with their wholly fabricated case against Manny Aragon. Or perhaps, last October, Iglesias simply didn’t want to rush the indictment, and it’s a “righteous beef.” One could reject the first option on the basis of “oh c’mon, they couldn’t be that stupid.” … Hmmm … Okay, so maybe it is possible.

But I’ll pass on all such speculation. It’ll come out. Actually, now having read some news reports, it seems like a strong case. So, it’s a matter of Iglesias not wanting to rush it, as opposed to it being trumped-up.

There is another, very clear effect of Purgegate, on this and on all other US Attorney cases. Think about it. You’re Manny Aragon, Democrat, maybe guilty or maybe innocent. In either case, Mr. Aragon will be talking to the judge real soon: “Come on, your Honor. I was framed. Don’t you read the newspapers? This is a put-up job orchestrated by Pete Domenici, Heather Wilson, Karl Rove, and their new puppet here in New Mexico. After all, David Iglesias wouldn’t indict me, and they fired him. My indictment is a travesty and a sham.”

What’s the judge going to say?

Bud Cummins, another fired USA, makes this same point in an article in Salon: How Bush’s Justice Department has lost it’s credibility:

It is almost a certainty that the talented and hardworking law enforcement agents and prosecutors working on this significant case [the Aragon indictment] will now have to battle accusations of improper political motivation behind the prosecution. There will be no real basis for it, but they will have to answer the allegations nonetheless. Before the U.S. attorneys scandal, the defense team never would have considered using those allegations. Now, it is almost a certainty that they will be raised because of the way the administration carried out the U.S. attorney dismissals.

Oh yes, every single guilty Democrat, indicted by any of the other non-fired 85 USA’s is going to say the same thing in coming months. How many guilty Democrats are going to walk because of this bullshit?

Comments

  1. jfxgillis wrote:

    Commie, that’s very much the point of my objection to David Brooks’ “good pollitics/bad politics” rationalization regarding the purge in my very first column in the newsvine.com account I just opened:

    Pat Tillman’s Medal and Alberto Gonzales’ Fired Prosecutors

    ANY partisan-political firing of a US Attorney is unacceptable because such an approach renders ALL such prosecutors–and the prosecutions they bring or drop or delay–suspect on grounds of potential partisan bias. There simply can’t be only one “improper” firing and seven “proper” ones because the one improper one indicates that partisan concerns are a factor in such decisions, whether or not they are evident in any particular case. That is why all the nit picking about numbers of immigration cases or paucity of death penalties sought is pointless. It’s the presence of the partisan factor in the process that is important, not the extent to which the factor is manifest in one case or another.

    Posted 30 Mar 2007 at 11:37 pm

  2. mothra wrote:

    “How many guilty Democrats are going to walk because of this bullshit?”

    Exactly.

    And, similarly, how many guilty Republicans are not being prosecuted because of this bullshit?

    Posted 30 Mar 2007 at 11:47 pm

  3. commissar wrote:

    Mothra,

    A little explanation may be in order. I’m a conservative Republican. So are some of my readers. By my comment I meant to imply “So even if you are a conservative Republican, a person pleased to see Dems convicted, can you see how counter-productive this fiasco has been?”

    Posted 31 Mar 2007 at 7:43 am

  4. canuckistani wrote:

    I remember, during the Tom Delay soap opera, his defenders telling us to ignore the indictments because “you could indict a ham sandwich”. Do they still say so now?

    I’m not going to suggest for a second that democrats are incapable of corruption; but I agree that any potential case has been poisoned, and I do have to wonder why a Bush appointed USA didn’t push the prosecution forward.

    Posted 31 Mar 2007 at 10:39 am

  5. commissar wrote:

    Canuck,

    I do have to wonder why a Bush appointed USA didn’t push the prosecution forward.

    Let’s not get too tangled up and suspicious. I apologize if I have created undue suspicion.

    In reading the news accounts, the case against Aragon looks like a very good one. We can strongly presume that it was a matter of timing. Iglesias had to get his ducks in a row before issuing the indictment. Domenici and Wilson wanted their pre-election headline.

    I shouldn’t have pushed it beyond that.

    Indeed, that’s bad enough. They would have preferred a timely headline rather than a solid indictment.

    Posted 31 Mar 2007 at 10:57 am

  6. rachel wrote:

    At least a few of all those Dems they’ve been investigating must have done something illegal.

    Posted 31 Mar 2007 at 11:29 am

  7. commissar wrote:

    rachel,

    I haven’t touched that one yet. The study claims that the USAs have been prosecuting low-level Dems greatly disproportionately to their numbers.

    Posted 31 Mar 2007 at 12:59 pm

  8. Pinko Punko wrote:

    Cummins piece, like some of Iglesias’ comments really say “look, a-holes, WE are Republicans too, and everything about this stinks.” They knew they could function as USAs while being personally Republican. There does not seem to be a separation anymore.

    Posted 31 Mar 2007 at 2:47 pm

  9. Patterico wrote:

    To me, the real question is: “How many Democrats will walk because some Democrats have alleged, with almost zero evidence, that U.S. Attorneys were dismissed in order to interfere with political prosecutions?”

    And the answer, by the way, is almost certainly “None.”

    What’s the judge going to say? I’ll tell you exactly what he’ll say. “Save it for the TV cameras. This is a court of law.”

    Posted 01 Apr 2007 at 4:51 pm

  10. commissar wrote:

    Patterico,

    Cummins notes that defense attorneys will bring them up:

    Before the U.S. attorneys scandal, the defense team never would have considered using those allegations. Now, it is almost a certainty that they will be raised because of the way the administration carried out the U.S. attorney dismissals.

    Maybe just in front of TV cameras.

    Posted 01 Apr 2007 at 5:36 pm

  11. Patterico wrote:

    They’ll bring them up in court, sure.

    And get slapped down by the judge.

    You didn’t address my point that, given the almost complete lack of evidence that the dismissals were tied to political prosecutions, the fault for this situation arguably lies with Democrats.

    Sure, Republicans should have done a better job explaining themselves — and I fault the Administration for that. But do you really think the Democrats would accept the explanations? Even now, they ignore the plethora of contemporaneous concerns shown in the e-mails re Lam, Charlton, etc.

    Posted 01 Apr 2007 at 6:30 pm

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